Interesting Facts about Rabbits...

[Stringmaker]

Thanks to the folks behind QI:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/qi/10004221/QI-some-quite-interesting-facts-about-rabbits.html

For starters, they were here during Roman times so forget about them being brought over by the Normans...

 

[Bushwhacker]

And not even they have it correct.

"Today, rabbit damage is reckoned at around £100 million a year. "

It's more like upwards of £250 million - it's not only crops that get damaged, but infrastructure too.

 

[Corfe]

So it wasn't the Normans after all. Could the Romans have introduced them?? The plot thickens...

 

[Bushwhacker]

So it wasn't the Normans after all. Could the Romans have introduced them?? The plot thickens...

Rabbit bones have been found at archaeological digs on Roman sites.

 

[HillBill]

I always thought it was the Romans that brought them here.. Never heard it said it was the Normans tbh

 

[Dave]

Rare rabbit

The Sumatran striped rabbit (Nesolagus netscheri) is so rare and shy that there is no word for it in the local language where it lives. It was thought extinct in the Thirties, and has only been seen three times since.

 

[daveO]

Rabbit bones have been found at archaeological digs on Roman sites.

It's a bit of a leap to assume from that alone that the Romans introduced the wild populations though.

 

[Bushwhacker]

It's a bit of a leap to assume from that alone that the Romans introduced the wild populations though.

The commonly held belief is that rabbits were not in the UK before Norman times. Dating of the bones has proved otherwise.

 

[brambles]

I've never thought the Normans had anything to do with it, as I've always known my Roman ancestors brought them to Britain , along with pheasants.

 

[Bushwhacker]

http://www.animalcorner.co.uk/britishwildlife/rabbits.html

http://www.ypte.org.uk/animal/rabbit/162

Oh look, even the RSPB!
http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/wildlifegarden/atoz/r/rabbit.aspx

The Romans brought them here first, but had better methods of containing them by the sounds of it.
It would seem that the ones we see now are descendants of the Norman rabbits.

 

[boatman]

Bones of other beasts brought in by Romans have been found. Great leap to say they introduced them.Strange that for something like six hundred years there isn't a mention of them. Then, why if they were common in the wild, would the Normans have gone to the expense of creating warrens? Regia Anglorum have done a fair amount of research and don't see rabbits until after the Normans. As with eels one would have expected part rents to have been paid in coneys, which they were not.

 

[spandit]

I always thought it was the Romans that brought them here.. Never heard it said it was the Normans tbh

Same here. My spaniel caught and killed a young bunny yesterday so there's one less in Sussex at least...

 

[boatman]

Same with Fallow deer, possibly here about ten thousand plus years ago then extinct. Bones found at Fishbourne Roman Villa so maybe some brought by Romans but not seen in the wild until after a Norman re-re-introduction. All this goes to show is that the past is more complicated than we thought.

 

[brambles]

As with eels one would have expected part rents to have been paid in coneys, which they were not.

If following the Roman model, rabbit would have been the farmed preserve of the ruling classes, not peasants, so no peasant would be paying rent in something he had no access to and could not afford even if he had.

 

[boatman]

QUOTE=brambles;1301624]If following the Roman model, rabbit would have been the farmed preserve of the ruling classes, not peasants, so no peasant would be paying rent in something he had no access to and could not afford even if he had.[/QUOTE]

No mention of Roman peasant but of post-Roman Britain, eg Anglo-Saxon, when presumably the rabbits if "introduced" would have become numerous enough to be useful/a problem. And the Norman operated exactly that restriction for the elite, after introducing rabbits, again, keeping them in warrens.

 

[Bushwhacker]

The Romans brought them here first, but had better methods of containing them by the sounds of it.
It would seem that the ones we see now are descendants of the Norman rabbits.

.............

 

[mountainm]

Ok, apart from the rabbits, seriously......

What have the Romans ever done for us?

 

[Stringmaker]

Romani ite domum!

 

[spandit]

Romani ite domum!

People called Romanes, they go, the house?


(I know, you got it right...)

 

[Stringmaker]

Now write it out a hundred times and if its not done by sunrise I'll...........